The Open Researcher Contributor Identification Initiative (ORCID) iD is an alphanumeric identifier for researchers, which clearly identifies them and facilitates different activities of the research process. In addition, the ORCID iD complies with ISO standard 277729, opens an external URL in a new window.

There are over nine million active ORCID iDs, opens an external URL in a new window worldwide and the number of works linked to ORCID iD has long since passed the 100 million mark.

FAQ

  • to clearly reference and identify your publications, and receive direct recognition for them
  • to facilitate publication management
  • to import data for funding applications and data management plans

Register in person on the ORCID website, opens an external URL in a new window.

Registration requires your name, email address and a password. It also requires that you choose visibility settings for your ORCID records. These visibility settings can be customized for each element of the records (employment, education and qualifications, works, funding, memberships and services) individually.

Once you have registered, you will receive an email to verify your email address.

ORCID allows four categories of works (publication, conference, intellectual property and other), which cover all research results and artistic works.

The works can be entered manually or imported automatically from databases (such as BASE, opens an external URL in a new window, Crossref, opens an external URL in a new window or DataCite, opens an external URL in a new window). 

Yes, there are other identifiers, such as Scopus Author ID (Elsevier), ResearcherID (Clarivate) or arXiv Author ID (arXiv repository).

  • Scopus Author ID:

Authors with publications indexed in Scopus automatically receive a Scopus ID. A profile contains the identifier, references, quotes from works, h-index and subject areas. It is a service of Elsevier, which is integrated with other products, such as Mendeley. Publications from a Scopus profile can be imported into an ORCID record.

  • ResearcherID:

ResearcherID allows researchers to create an online profile to list their publications. Publications indexed in the Web of Science (WOS) are automatically imported. ResearcherID allows linking to an ORCID iD.

  • arXiv Author ID:

An arXiv Author ID is an author identification within the repository arXiv and is used to clearly identify documents in the arXiv repository. An arXiv Author ID is defined and maintained by the author, and the profile is stocked semi-automatically.

 

The advantage of ORCID over other identifiers is that it is not connected to one publisher or repository. Any person whose activities are related to research can create a profile.